What did kids think of the 2023 Cannes Grand Prix winners?

Kids are brutally honest, and also have no business agendas—which kind of makes them the perfect jurors for advertising award shows.

With this in mind, the agency Episode Four rounded up a bunch of children for the first annual Cannes Cubs awards, in which the kids evaluate the G- and PG-rated Cannes Lions Grand Prix winners from 2023. They also got Jae Goodman—founder and CEO of Superconnector Studios, and previously a longtime CAA Marketing and Observatory leader—to be guest host and presiding juror.

So, what did these kids—whose parents all work in advertising—think of the big Cannes winners this year? The roundup video below reveals all.

I would have figured “R.I.P. Leon” (one of two Film Lions Grand Prix honorees this year) would be the runaway winner, but it seems the kids are a bit more nuanced—or downright confused—than that.

Calvin Lyte and Bipasha Mookherjee, creative directors at Episode Four, told Ad Age they came up with the idea for Cannes Cubs while watching some of this year’s Cannes work on Zoom together.

“We were wondering if we are taking ourselves too seriously as an industry,” said Lyte. “My son, who sometimes drops in on my Zoom meetings, looked over my shoulder and made some amusing comments about the work. This made us wonder how would other kids judge the work setting industry benchmarks and winning big awards? The ones their parents are creating, winning or judging.” 

Lyte and Mookherjee added that they took away three main lessons about what we can actually learn from kids reviewing advertising work:

• “To not take ourselves and our work so seriously.”
• “Going beyond TV spots and solving creative problems in unexpected ways is ‘smart’ as long as it is simple or ‘makes sense’—in their words—and is also entertaining. Music can also play a huge role.”
• “We should all be calling ads ‘advertisements.’”